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A Trio of Lawrence Alumni Succeed as Coaches
Jeff Chew ’78, Steve Collins ’89 and Craig Haase ’93 all continue their success after their playing days
The successes of the Lawrence University men’s basketball team over the past decade have been well documented, but a trio of Lawrence alumni have flexed their muscle on the Wisconsin high school hardwood lately.
Jeff Chew ’78, Steve Collins ’89 and Craig Haase ’93 have all captured Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association (WIAA) championships in the past two seasons.
Haase, the coach at Hartland Arrowhead High School, squared off against Collins, the coach at Madison Memorial in the Division 1 boys’ championship game back in March. Haase’s team posted a 72-51 victory and denied Collins a second consecutive state title.
Collins’ Memorial team beat Racine Horlick 56-41 for the Division 1 title in 2009. That was the second state championship for Collins, whose team also won the Division 1 crown in 2005. Chew won his first WIAA title in 2009 when his Menasha St. Mary Central girls’ team beat Potosi 45-42 for the Division 4 championship.
Chew, who won a Wisconsin Independent Schools Athletic Association with the Zephyrs in the late 1990s, was a football and baseball standout at Lawrence. Chew was asked to play basketball by coach Russ Ullsperger, “With playing two other sports, it wasn’t conducive to getting through Lawrence,” Chew said with a chuckle.
Chew, who has worked at Pierce Manufacturing for the past 32 years, has coached at St. Mary Central for 16 seasons and amassed a record of 284-100 for a .740 winning percentage. Chew has picked up seven conference championships along the way and is being assisted by former Lawrence women’s basketball player and St. Mary Central teacher Jubilee Johnson ’98.
Collins has put together a stunning run of success during this decade. Memorial has reached the WIAA state tournament for seven consecutive seasons with the Spartans finishing first or second six times. Prior to Collins’ arrival, Memorial, which opened in 1966, had never been to the state tourney.
“I think they had had five or six winning seasons before I took over,” said Collins, who has a record of 232-60 (.795) and seven Big Eight Conference titles to his credit. “We had two or three groups come through that were basketball players and they bought into everything. Then it snowballed from there. I would have never thought that (we would have had this kind of success). I feel very blessed.”
A Madison native who attended cross-town rival Madison East, Collins played basketball at Lawrence for Mike Gallus. Collins likes to joke with his players, which includes one the nation’s best in Vander Blue (he’s headed to Marquette University in the fall), that he had one of the best shooting percentages in Lawrence history. “I only took shots I knew I could make,” Collins said with a laugh. Collins will now annually face former Lawrence teammate Matt Miota ’91, who was recently hired as the boys’ basketball coach at Madison East.
While Collins and Miota were teammates, he had never met Haase until the pair shook hands before the tip-off of the state title game in March. Memorial built an eight-point lead at the half before Arrowhead stormed back to win the first boys’ basketball title in school history.
“We talked about doing something no Arrowhead team had ever done before. I told them they literally were going to write their own history,” said Haase, who has a record of 163-73 (.691) in 10 seasons at Arrowhead. “There wasn’t a lot of pressure on us when we got there. I think that played to our advantage. I told them during the shootaround, ‘You guys will be dancing on this W (at half-court of Kohl Center) when it’s all done.’ ”
Haase, who attended Arrowhead and has taught United States history there for 16 years, said he had trouble comprehending what his team had done. “It was an overwhelming feeling,” he said. “There were a lot of thoughts racing through my head. You try to look around and take it all in.”
Haase also played for Gallus at Lawrence but started his college career at rival Ripon College. He said after two years at Ripon, he needed a change if he was going to continue to playing. “It was a real blessing,” Haase said of the move to Lawrence, where he earned All-Midwest Conference honors in 1993. “It’s one of things that I’m thankful for – that Lawrence gave me a chance to play basketball.”
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